Spellslingers.All right. Through the magic of excel, indesign, and manic energy, I have a working demo of a game up, with about 95 cards to pull from. It was easier than I thought. Aubrey helped me brainstorm some concepts, and the mechanics we're talking about have made it pretty easy. Running with the working title Spellslingers.

High Concept: (What is the game about?)The idea is of two casters dueling. At their disposal are arcane equipment, spells of various kinds, and a host of summons. The goal is to beat down the opponent before they beat down you.

Casters:Each player is represented by a Caster, (*coughmagicough*) who has a set amount of life, a native aura (explained later,) a set of starting cards, and an ability or two.

Deckbuilding, card types, and rarity.The player's deck consists of 40 cards, a mixture of spells, equipment, and summons. Each card has a rarity value. This determines how many copies of that card may be in a specific deck, as well as how many copies come in the the full set. (for example, the fireball card has a rarity of 3, so a deck can include 3 copies, while a pyromancer's spellbook has a rarity of 1, so only one copy can be included in each deck.)

Spells come in two types: Enchantment and Sorcery. Enchantments stay in play, while sorcery cards are discarded when played. Equipment tends to add abilities to what the caster can do. A player can have only one copy of a specific equipment in play at any given time. Summons are critters. Many casters, equipment, and summons have abilities. Each of these abilities can only be used once per turn. (terms largely taken from MTG, and should probably change.)

The Aura System:Many cards have an aura requirement to be played. A player can only play a card if their caster has enough aura. Casters will start with a "native aura," but this is too low to play most cards. They will have to build their aura up in order to cast bigger spells.

Many other cards also have an aura value. When a card is discarded from play, the player may instead slide it under their caster so that only the aura value at the bottom is showing. This adds to the Caster's starting Aura, increasing the power level of the spells they can cast. Casting spells or summons does not generally require that a character discard this aura, so it should increase as the game progresses.

Some spells and abilities demand that a character discard aura from their character. This sets up a decision-point where a player has to choose whether to spend their aura, or save it to cast bigger stuff. They cannot discard their native aura, so they'll at least be able to cast minor spells.

(I've only got one faction right now, but casting off-region spells would be possible, they'd just have to trick in a way to get more than one kind of aura rolling.)

Death and Dying:Critters and Casters have a Life value, and Critters have an Attack value. When they take damage, damage is tracked by dice. If the damage is higher than their life value, they die.

A critter can attack once per turn, but not on the turn they are cast. When they attack, they choose a target, and attack the target directly. Damage is dealt simultaneously by the attacker and defender. A critter can only attack an opposing caster if that caster is undefended, meaning they have no critters in play. A caster cannot be defeated if they still have a creature in play.

Draw: Players draw one card at the end of each turn. No hand limit.

I was going to use an action-point mechanic in this, but when I was gold-fishing it, it really didn't need it. The Aura system seems to work well, but that's just my own goldfishing. I need a live brain to play against. Not tonight, for sure, but soon.

A 3v3 mechanic for the casters would be very interesting, but I want to get the 1v1 functional first.

Anyway, This is very much riffing from other games, but the purpose is to really see how the Aura system could work out.

What happened to this game?EDIT: Never mind. Full force Squirrel Attack, by Matt.

Last edited by TheMatt on Mon May 19, 2014 4:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

"I can't tell if what you are saying is too profound for me to understand, or just insane".

Duel-region magi is simple. Every magi starts with an aura of 2. You can have two of the same symbol, or two different symbols. There should also be a 'wild' magi (think Engines in TTR) that only has 1, but that 1 can be used as any faction.

Minion has 'tilted' for tapped. Also, has a mechanism where cards get turned face down and can't be targetted.

Summoning sickness needs to go. That mtg did not just say 'comes into play tapped' for critters has always puzzled me.

When they attack, they choose a target, and attack the target directly. Damage is dealt simultaneously by the attacker and defender. A critter can only attack an opposing caster if that caster is undefended, meaning they have no critters in play

Targeted attacking seems problematic to me, but eh.

"I can't tell if what you are saying is too profound for me to understand, or just insane".

Are there any instant/interrupt style spells? (Ie, the stack).Are their any spells you can play on the other players turn at all?

Burning Aura a card effect, not part of base rules.

Rarity value seems a good way to do things--with an expanding CCG, card power is variable. With a fixed deck, power level (assuming sufficient playtesting) is pretty fixed.

TERMS: 'Base Aura', not 'native Aura.Did you proxy the game out with 1+ factions/colors? Any 'gold' cards?

Why tracked by dice? Are the dice being rolled? If not, you should say 'tokens or dice'.

Creature damage is 'fight' damage--each creature can choose a target.Is their summoning sickness? If so, what prevents me from targeting creatures as they come into play?Can I fight a single creature with multiple creatures?Can I 'band' multiple creatures so that they fight a creature at once?

SNOWBALLWhere is the snowball preventer? Are you going to make reset style 'wrath of god' or 'armageddon' spells the default balancing mechanic? Would certainly prevent anyone from getting too far ahead, but could make games go far too long.

40 card decks. What happens when people run out of cards?...Decking mechanic might not be a terrible way to count HP--in no way diminishes present options, (although it does mean drawing reduces your life, and draw and discard mechanics are much pricier than in MTG.....Star-Wars had an interesting decking mechanic--two discard piles: Used and Lost. Used was what you discarded. Lost was for 'killed' creatures and a limited number of 'use once' interrupts.

"I can't tell if what you are saying is too profound for me to understand, or just insane".